God Problems
As excerpted from a comment by Hazzbuzz a couple posts back:
“How can you feel more connected to God or more isolated from God if God is nature and nothing more . . . ? Wouldn't . . . it mean doing whatever comes naturally even if that was hitting your neighbour over the head with a large stick? . . .
“I'm still not sure about morality but there is something empty about looking at it that way which doesn't quite fit with my experience . . ."
Pantheistic Problems
Morality: Others have made similar comments now and then that lead me to think they may view pantheism as problematic in the same sense that Hazzbuzz does. The problem is that nature isn’t moral. The perception is that theism is required to make moral sense of life.
Faith: A second problem people often have with pantheism is the idea that nature doesn’t justify faith. Mortality is the central issue; many see the only resolution to the problem of mortality as a supernatural God that brings the dead back to life.
Personhood: A third problem arises for those who want God to be person-like; pantheism is perceived as a radical departure from this.
Theistic Problems
Veracity: The chief problem with theism is that unlike nature or the world itself, the existence of a supernatural God isn’t obvious or even demonstrable. People usually refer to their faith or belief in God and not their knowledge of God. Belief is often predicated on texts understood by believers as revealed truth, but to date no revealed religion has prevailed on the rest of the world to adopt this perspective on their scripture.
The Problem of Evil: Given belief in God as a supernatural entity, the world still remains what it is. Nature doesn’t behave morally, and people often behave much worse than nature. Enter “the problem of evil:" a pre-moral natural world and an often immoral human world whose existence appears to contradict the existence of an all powerful/all good Entity.
Can people think of any additional major problems with pantheism or theism?
PS: I should probably mention that these more thought-provoking posts are only meant to be, well . . . thought provoking. From time to time, people read me as someone who is personally grappling with intellectual problems around God. I really don’t. That would be Kermit.
“How can you feel more connected to God or more isolated from God if God is nature and nothing more . . . ? Wouldn't . . . it mean doing whatever comes naturally even if that was hitting your neighbour over the head with a large stick? . . .
“I'm still not sure about morality but there is something empty about looking at it that way which doesn't quite fit with my experience . . ."
Pantheistic Problems
Morality: Others have made similar comments now and then that lead me to think they may view pantheism as problematic in the same sense that Hazzbuzz does. The problem is that nature isn’t moral. The perception is that theism is required to make moral sense of life.
Faith: A second problem people often have with pantheism is the idea that nature doesn’t justify faith. Mortality is the central issue; many see the only resolution to the problem of mortality as a supernatural God that brings the dead back to life.
Personhood: A third problem arises for those who want God to be person-like; pantheism is perceived as a radical departure from this.
Theistic Problems
Veracity: The chief problem with theism is that unlike nature or the world itself, the existence of a supernatural God isn’t obvious or even demonstrable. People usually refer to their faith or belief in God and not their knowledge of God. Belief is often predicated on texts understood by believers as revealed truth, but to date no revealed religion has prevailed on the rest of the world to adopt this perspective on their scripture.
The Problem of Evil: Given belief in God as a supernatural entity, the world still remains what it is. Nature doesn’t behave morally, and people often behave much worse than nature. Enter “the problem of evil:" a pre-moral natural world and an often immoral human world whose existence appears to contradict the existence of an all powerful/all good Entity.
Can people think of any additional major problems with pantheism or theism?
PS: I should probably mention that these more thought-provoking posts are only meant to be, well . . . thought provoking. From time to time, people read me as someone who is personally grappling with intellectual problems around God. I really don’t. That would be Kermit.
Posted by Paul at 7:02 PM Permalink
31 Comments:
I would imagine that more women believe in God than men, because we get to enjoy the gift of carrying a child for nine months, and passing it through something that is about the size of a pea. Boy, if that ain't miraculous, I don't know what is!!!
But seriously, the miracle of a human life growing inside of you is just proof enough to me that God exists. Eyesight is miraculous, as well (I find it amazing that a ball of flesh can actually "see"). I just don't think that I came from an amoeba. I'm way too complex. And where did the amoeba come from? It had to come from somewhere.
"Faith" means believing in something I can't see or have no proof of. Of course, this holds true with God on a long term basis. But moms who send their sons or daughters off to war have faith in the unknown and unseen every single day of their lives.
We don't know what we can not see, whether it's God or it's something of this earth. We can only have faith, or "hope"...Gosh, that's so much better than living a life believing in nothing! If I'm wrong, at least my life was good and hopeful while I was alive, and when I'm dead, I won't know the difference. But if non-believers are right, what a miserable life they had all along! It's like, what's the point in living? All I did was question the "believers" every day of my life, and I had no hope for something better. I just knew I was gonna die, and that's it. Wow, that's a downer.
I'm rambling, I know. It's the wine. But I refuse to believe our existence is pointless.
...Forgive me if I'm behaving like Kermit.
good or bad acts all r natural to a humanbeing. But just look at this way. If u hit someone on the head with a stick, how wud u and that person feel? HORRIBLE right? That explains what's Godly and whats not.
Keshi.
Also, ethologists (animal behavior scientists) challenge the idea of nature as devoid of morality. They are finding evidence for degrees of morality in higher order animals.
The question is, how ought we to live? What makes a quality life? This is the core of ethical thinking. Theism informs us in this regard but one can be moral without it.
I know exactly what you mean by death as apparently undermining life’s meaning and your deep sense of the wrongness and unacceptability of life as meaningless. However, as to your reasoning, you do indeed emulate Kermit somewhat in heading off in multiple directions!
How about if I first pick and choose one of them and secondly make a general observation:
1. Much of what you say expresses the “teleological argument” for
God’s existence or “argument from design.” There is order (complexity, design) in the universe; therefore there must be a Designer.
This is one of a number of logical proofs for the existence of God that were formulated in the Middle Ages. Logically, none of them end up working. You could probably find out why online. If not and people are interested, I could post it.
2. If there truly were strong, slam-dunk evidence for God’s existence, then long ago you'd think that widespread agreement about this would have arisen. I tend to doubt that the basis for faith is evidence.
KESHI: I think you’re onto something there. You could even say that our future depends on enough people figuring out fast enough that hitting other people over the head hurts/diminishes the self as well as the other.
KATHY: Sounds from the quote like George Breed and Thich Nhat Hanh may have a lot in common. TNH and Buddhism generally discuss the interdependence of everything in the UNIverse, which is very literally true.
You see the major problem with God as being our interpretation of him . . . sounds like your premise is God’s existence? To me the major problem, if we’re talking about God as a supernatural force or entity, is that the premise can’t be demonstrated. Of course, for many millions of people, this isn’t an obstacle to belief.
If we’re talking, on the other hand, about a God that is not apart from nature, I’d see the problem as a matter of being clear and compelling about just what it is concerning nature that we identify with God, which may be what you mean by speaking of interpretation.
KARIN: Good points – while theism helps some people lead moral lives, it’s clearly not the only basis for morality. The Dali Lama seems like a pretty good guy . . . And that relationship you cite between moral behavior and “quality of life” looks essential to me too.
While it’s worth noting that nature “red in tooth and claw” is only one aspect of nature, I think Hazzbuzz’s general position still applies when viewing nature as a mixed picture. People want being or reality to ultimately affirm human values at their best; without God as part of that picture, many don’t see how that affirmation gets made.
so whats the major problem with God? nothing really...everything is the way it should be right? in nature everything dies...including us, so whats the problem? i forgot?
On the subject of fighting, I've met people who enjoy a good fight
If I go the theism rt in the morning, I see things similar to dust-bunny. I tend to have a telogical view of the world, I see nature and I see extraordinary designs, I study medicine or biochemistry or ecology and I am in awe with the intricacies yet at times sheer simplicity of the workings of nature. I am inclined to worship the infinitive intellect of such a design.
If I wake up and go the panthesism rt, I find myself having a spiritual experience by marveling/communing/praying/meditating/rolling/etc at a thunderstorm or the brilliance of a single leaf. And I find myself wanting to dance and sing and worship in response to that experience.
I am not sure I will be disappointed either way in the end, if God is nature, praise God, if God had a hand in designing/creating/evolving
/sneezing out nature, praise God.
The morality issue is a bit more a pickle when you straddle the line (or really in general). I suppose I was brainwashed at an early age with a very theistic view of morality and I am still mucking through that somewhat. But it serves me well, i tend to extend it beyond just people though and on to nature itself. Treat others as you want to be treated, treat the natural world that sustains you in a way that sustains it...
Perhaps I too am much like Kermit.
KATHY: I see religion and spirituality as full of problems. Most of them are problems of language or logic. Sometimes these are disingenuous; at other times people are genuinely trying to communicate. The non-semantic problems are far fewer in number, but to me they appear very real.
Hopelessness would be an example. It’s the feature of clinical depression most highly correlated with suicide. Mortality can negate hope and undermine life’s meaning where death is perceived as the final and ultimate eradication of those we love.
The death of a loved one is a problem even with a hopeful outlook, especially when it's a premature or a painfully violent or protracted death. We have to work through it. Knowing that everything in nature dies doesn’t preclude our grief and having to come to terms with what has happened.
Unnecessary suffering would be another example of a non-semantic problem that religion and spirituality recognizes: social injustice, human rights violations and crime.
HAZZBUZZ: To me, an important thing about contact with nature is that this is a powerful way to directly experience something of our personal connection to the whole of which you speak. I think it’s the actual experience of this connection to “the One in whom we live and move and have our being” – and the process of overcoming barriers to this experience – that’s spiritually significant and makes a practical difference in how we lead our lives. There seem to be a number of ways and levels at which we can experience the connection and breaking through barriers to it over the course of a lifetime.
AMY: Your comment highlights what strike me as a couple of important points:
First, the experience of awe or wonder in response to life, which perhaps we most dependably have in response to nature, is a fact of human experience regardless of whether or not there’s a supernatural presence involved. You don’t have to believe in God to have the experience.
Second, this experience shouldn’t be confused with the teleological argument for God’s existence that I referred to briefly above in replying to Dust-bunny.
“Treat others as you want to be treated, treat the natural world that sustains you in a way that sustains it...” Sounds good to me. If enough people were ever to live that way, life on this planet would be transformed. Earth would move a long way toward heaven, so to speak.
though i must say it is because of my incapacity to absorb beyond a paragraph of words.
And then of course there is the question: What is the true nature of man? And is that nature moral?
Is it possible morality is only needed in the presence of free will and choice? Why else would morality be needed?
And what of God's will? Does God require a will, or is it simply man's need to believe there is any (particular) will associated with the Divine? That particular will of course flows from our conditioned belief that a separate "I" exists apart from all other "I's" and God. It is then we require a moral code.
Of the three branches of ethics (moral philosophy), metaethics seems closest to the issues you've raised here. From where do our ethical (moral) principles arise? God? Nature? Our own creation?
MISTIPURPLE: I’d actually enjoy doing more of that, but the subject matter keeps getting in the way! Maybe I just need to do more puppets . . .
RIMSHOT: By unnecessary I mean suffering that’s caused by other people and that therefore looks as if it could be eliminated or ameliorated. For example, abolition and then the civil rights movement were effective in reducing the suffering of African Americans.
TOMAS K, thanks for stopping by. I imagine there are similarities and also differences in the effect and meaning of disability in the individual life. If it doesn’t defeat you, it strengthens you – I think that would be one of the similarities. Examples of where differences can arise would be where you happened to be spiritually at the time of onset and whether you were born with the disability or acquired it later in life.
DON I: Early days . . . contemporary times. These issues very much live on, from what I can see on the blogs. For example, I’ve repeatedly encountered the teleological argument for the existence of God although it was disproved centuries ago. Such perennial philosophical issues also persist in divinity schools, often with new labels.
Like you, it seems to me that many of these issues are often not examined with regard to their fundamental assumptions; I like to use some of my posts to encourage people to do that kind of thinking.
For example, you ask “Is it possible morality is only needed in the presence of free will and choice? Why else would morality be needed?”
Notice how loaded with connotations the word “morality” is? Maybe it’s just me, but I get an instant mental flash of two stone tablets with The Ten Commandments engraved upon them, strongly suggesting that the essence of morality is following an external list of prohibitions. And as you suggest – consistent, I think, with this impression – morality would then be all about free will and choice and maybe punishing those who freely choose evil just because they are evildoers and hate America, the Bible, and apple pie.
You don’t see the essence of morality – or perhaps “right action” or constructive behavior – in such terms. Me either. But many do, and so I find it worth discussing.
Your other questions/comments are far reaching and could easily take multiple posts to look at. To me, they indicate that some of these philosophical issues really do warrant continued consideration. I’d add, for example, this one: What is “the divine” as distinct from God?
For now, to touch on one of the questions you raise, you ask, “From where do our ethical (moral) principles arise? God? Nature? Our own creation?” From what I can see, principles, though helpful and important, are not morality’s source. I believe the source is actually an interaction and couldn’t pick one of the entities you suggest. Too abstract, I know, but to put it in context would take a book chapter. (Such as Original Faith, Chapter Six!)
PAULINE: Sounds right to me. I'd only add that although we can't fully know the meaning of life, we can live it.
God can say hi to you if you have his holy spirit.Thats the software
god uses to talk to people,
But you haft to put God first place in your life not second,are satan wil have you thinking his way.
I operate with gift 7 of the nine.
The reason you cant see god are angels,are falen angels,is because
of the way our natural eyes work.
They are not hidden,their all over the place,I have seen angels,demons
label fallen angels in the holy bible,The spirit world works very high on the scale.with the proper software
you can get to know god,and all his ways.but satan and his host of hell dont wont to be exposed,that i can do,because of gift 7,but when
i do you then have a battle on your hands,because satan does not wont people to know the Truth,Because once you find out the Truth,you can no longer wont a lie.What does Jesus say,The truth will set you free.And you will no longer believe the lie of satan,
Satan and his fallen angels can control our tongue,thoughts,and body,any time they wont,With the exception of a christian with his holy spirit,he will expose all the works of satan in peoples lives
And demon spirits can be in christians bodys and they wont even know it.
A good example the christians that have been kiling people on the news.
If you kill people are even wont to
you do not know god and demon spirits are controling your life,and you will hurt other people.
Satan wonts the family torn down,once the family goes,so goes the nation.In his service kingdom of God
ROBERT: Sounds like you know what you believe.
We don't understand how thoughts and emotions can be produced by a three pound bundle of neurons. We can formulate how it developed by comparing it to our relatives and the other animals but the main thing that our Brain did was keep us alive long enough to reproduce...everything else is just conversation.
This fear or wariness of the unknown is what kept us out of the mouths of all the predators that were far more powerful than our frail little bodies. Through trial and error, visit the Darwin Awards to see what I am talking about, a few brave risk takers discovered things that gave us a leg up and we were smart enough to take full advantage of these discoveries.
Somewhere along the line the brain's three main cognitive functions language, emotions, and decision making, got together and said Hey wait a minute..how come we are so different than all of these other creatures? From this point on we have never stopped asking that question..so we separated ourselves from Nature and decided that we were uber-special...and because we are so unique God must be different than Nature too.
This is why most of us tend to pan Pantheism because it doesn't make sense that we would surpass Creation and it's Creator.
btw I wanna know ur thoughts on the EGO...read my current post when u hv time. tnxx in advance!
Keshi.
As for just how the idea of God evolved, so to speak, and why theism appears more prevalent today than pantheism – again, I would think lots of factors could be involved, including but not limited to those you cite.
KESHI: I’ll take a look. Ego is an entire chapter in my book. I think it’s the number one problem our species faces.
I have found a very simple solution around this, perhaps it has flaws, but then I am just human.
Instead of trying the difficult problem of defining and/or proving the Absolute's existence - insert Love in place.
Does Love exist? Prove it.
Allahu akbar - God is Great.
That being said, your original points in this post about the problems with religion and various variations of our views on deity... are valid points. It seems the more I delve into the quandry of belief in something we cannot quantify, I inevitably end up at the same conclusion - something that a highschool English/Drama teacher said to me in passing one time about the "Atheist's Argument": if there was no God, there would be no debate.
Here's a summary of what I learned about God from the responders to this particular post:
"...it is nature ... good or bad acts all r natural ... even he felt bad ... we'd do well to look at nature a lot more than we do ... God is the world ... You inspired me to look ... what is is ... makes it not seem empty anymore ... Treat others as you want to be treated ... You don't have to believe in God to have the experience ... I don't know? ... i love it ... Too many issues to address ... The situation you have described is well known to all of us who suffer ... Our own creation? ... no one really knows ... we can't fully know the meaning of life ... (((Hugs))) ... you can get to know god ... know what you believe ... God, is a product of our brain ... i wanna know ... just how the idea of God evolved ... I am just human ..."
Tim
Even when a theology defines its most basic term - "God" - the definition is usually given in terms so abstract and supernatural as to guarantee that God remains something whose nature and very existence people are bound to continue disagreeing about because it can't be demonstrated.
I notice you relate God to love. To me, this points straight to where people can begin focusing on what we have in common in the area of spirituality and religion. That's why my book, which does make use of the term God, uses it only in relation to experiences that need no proof or disproof because we've all had them.
It took years to feel my way along toward this approach. Belief in God as a supernatural entity or force is fundamental to the religious/spiritual perspectives of many of us. And most of us, including me, were raised to assume there is no other way to communicate about God.
Many people see many additional supernatural beliefs as essential too - Muhammad as Seal of the Prophets, Jesus as the Christ, resurrection, reincarnation, heaven, hell, the virginity of Mary, the immortal soul, the angels, the fallen angel...
In Original Faith, I’ve limited myself to what little I actually know about God. It's perfectly fine with me for others to read my book and go, "OK, this guy’s on to something; I can see this too. Of course, I also know/believe X, Y and Z..."
What I’m after is for people to take a breather from the endless debate society we've made of religion, and, even if it's just for 250 pages, focus attention on things that most of us would agree to agree on – and would agree are important – if we really looked at them.
Chapter One is "What Love Is..."
Sometimes simple assertions of this kind have a nice ring and contain real wisdom; sometimes when you look at them they don’t add up.
If there were no multiple universes there would be no debate; if evolution hadn’t occurred, there would be no debate; if there wasn’t intelligent life on other planets, there would be no debate… At an earlier time in history, it could have been said: “If the earth weren’t flat, there would be no debate” and “If there weren’t really such thing as Leprechauns, there would be no debate.”
The logic of the assertion goes: If something’s existence is debated then it must really exist. But a great deal of evidence is available to show that this isn’t true.
What you describe as a summary of this thread to me doesn’t read like one. I would think that coherently summarizing the comments thread of most blog posts would be hard to do, since discussion threads are, well, discussion threads – i.e., they contain many different points of view. Since this blog deliberately invites a variety of viewpoints, it could be especially hard to do here.
Personally, I don’t think that faith depends on proving that God exists or is even more likely to exist than not. However, people keep trying to do this, I suppose because they believe that it does.
I've so enjoyed the conversations in here, thank you!
amen.
Post a Comment